Long Beach CaLL (Career-Linked Learning) is a nonprofit organization that ensures all Long Beach students - from middle school to college - have access to inspiring work-based learning opportunities in growing and emerging career sectors, complementing what they learn in class, so that they gain the skills and knowledge needed to be successful members of our local economy.

Long Beach CaLL focuses much of its efforts around supporting the Linked Learning approach, which integrates rigorous academics that meet college-ready standards with sequenced, high-quality career-technical education, work-based learning, and supports to help students stay on track and be ready for college AND career.

Long Beach CaLL collaborates with employers, teachers, and administrators to provide a range of work-based learning opportunities, such as guest speaking, job shadowing, and internships, to ALL Long Beach students inside and outside of the classroom.

HISTORY OF LONG BEACH CaLL

In June 2012, a small team of researchers/practitioners from the Harvard Graduate School of Education and Jobs for the Future (JFF) visited Long Beach to look at the assets of the Long Beach education (higher education and K-12), non-profit, and business communities mapped against the Pathways to Prosperity framework. The Pathways to Prosperity Framework aims to ensure many more young people complete high school, attain a post-secondary credential with currency in the labor market, and launch into a career while leaving open the prospect of further education.

In September, 2012 a report based on this assessment pointed out the strong educational and community partnerships between the City Mayor, California State University, Long Beach (CSULB), Long Beach City College (LBCC), and Long Beach Unified School District (LBUSD) through the Long Beach College Promise. It was noted that LBUSD had adopted Linked Learning as its high school reform and college to career readiness initiative and when fully realized, would need to create a sequence of work-based learning opportunities for 23,000 high school students. Setting up such work based learning opportunities would require organization and time that neither the educational institutions nor businesses had capacity to put in place and sustain. With 90% of the Long Beach economy made of small businesses, their recommendation was to establish an intermediary to identify, prepare, and evaluate high school and post-secondary students in various work-based learning activities. The business community would join the partnership by providing those activities. Examples include: internships, job shadows, mock interviews, mentoring, informational interviews, review of student projects, participation in career fairs and others.

In October of 2012, a team from Long Beach, made up of representatives from each of the three educational institutions and business attended the Pathways to Prosperity Institute. While at the institute the team drafted a work plan for the 2012-2013 year which included establishing an intermediary that would foster students’ college and career-readiness after high school. Over the course of the year the team met several times and formed a small planning committee that would be responsible for moving the work forward. The team members were: